


No Longer Celia

by hafren



Category: Blake's 7
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-21
Updated: 2009-11-21
Packaged: 2017-10-03 11:45:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hafren/pseuds/hafren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A young Federation officer gets distracted from her mission</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Longer Celia

As a rule, I dislike blondes. Fancy them something rotten, yes. But resent that whole princess thing about them. The way they always get the starring roles in the fairy stories, dangling their golden tresses out of towers and marrying the prince. The way everyone's eyes automatically go to them. That dewy-fresh, only-just-unwrapped look I always associate with them. It was a novel experience for me, being besotted with someone I actually liked.

The tumbling hair I was running through my hands still shone gold, mostly, but there was the odd glint of silver too. And the face was lined - beautiful, but had definitely been out of its wrappers for some time. Once, oh yes. Would have been a real little Alpha princess, all pampered skin and arrogant certainty. I twisted one of the shining curls round my finger.

"I wouldn't have liked you when you were young," I said.

"Do you mind? I may look ancient to you but I'm only thirty-bloody-three!"

"You look older. No, I like that. You look like someone things have happened to. Someone who's been on journeys."

My blonde sighed. "That's true enough." She freed herself gently, went over to the window and stood looking out at the stars.

"How did someone like you get the wrong side of the law in the first place?" I asked. "You must have had everything you could want."

"Well, it wasn't planned. I wanted to be a pilot, so my parents paid for me to learn."

"Oh, naturally. Goes without saying." I wondered how many months of a beta-grade's salary that would cost, supposing they'd let us do it.

"Hey." She glanced round at me. "I didn't invent the Federation's social structure. I was trying to subvert it, actually. Once I had a licence, all these people were sidling up, wanting me to get them things they weren't supposed to have. My friends wanted banned vistapes and recreational drugs, mostly, but some of them knew people in the lower grades who'd pay for fancy clothes, jewellery, that sort of thing. Even though they couldn't wear it in public. Do you know, I'd never realised they weren't allowed? I thought they dressed that way because they weren't interested in clothes. And when I knew, I thought; why shouldn't they dress how they like? Why shouldn't people be able to read what they like, and watch what they like, and _live_ however they bloody like? So I started getting them what they wanted. There was a good profit in it, too."

She turned back to the window. I went over, took her shoulders and made her face me. She smiled down at me and kissed me on the mouth. She was wearing a necklace, a heavy rope of gold. I wrapped it around my hand and twisted, kissing deeply, until she gasped the name I was using at the time.

"Celia! Stop. Now." She had that note of command they all have. I stopped.

She got her breath back. "What was that in aid of?"

"Nothing." I sounded like a sulky child, even to me. I kept my face turned away from her.

"I thought maybe you'd suddenly remembered who you work for," she said.

I gasped as if she'd hit me. "How could you say that? You know I don't work for them any more. I told you."

"And what have you told them?"

"Nothing! I swear. I admit I was working for them when you gave me a job. But ever since ... ever since we..... I couldn't, not now. I have always been honest with you since then. I told you I'd been working for them - I didn't have to do that, did I?"

Her beautiful, worn face studied me intently. There was a red mark around her neck. So much more ornamental than the gold, because it was mine. She sighed. "You can't blame me. I only survived to be so ancient because I'm wary about trusting people." She ruffled my hair. "Like feathers," she said softly, "dark feathers. My hawk."

"That brings back prey? Who would you like me to kill for you? How about my ex-boss? I can get to him."

She laughed. "I doubt he trusts you any more; it's too long since you reported in. Anyway I don't want you anywhere near those people. You just keep watching my back when I'm buying and selling. The worst thing about being a smuggler is that nearly everyone we do business with is a crook. It's reassuring, knowing that my pet predator is more ruthless than theirs."

****  
"Sir?"

Marek Anand looked up from his work. "Yes? What is it, Lem?"

His young assistant looked uneasy. "Sir, there was a message from the Commissioner, asking what was the latest news from your undercover people. I didn't know what to tell her about Celia."

"So what did you say?"

"That you were running Celia yourself; that I didn't know the situation because I hadn't seen the reports but that I was sure everything was going to plan."

"Good. That should keep her quiet for a while."

"Sir.... is it true? As far as I know, Celia hasn't reported in for months."

"As far as you know. It's all right; don't worry about it." The young man left, looking relieved, and Anand sank his head in his hands. There was, indeed, no reason for Lem to worry, but he rather thought he might worry himself. What would happen if his controversial, personally-recruited star agent did not, in fact, ever report in again? The Commissioner would not be impressed, that was for sure.

And yet.... and yet he would have staked his career on this one. Had done, indeed. He'd had the usual fight with them upstairs, about employing a beta-grade for such work. Maybe, he thought, he should try another argument; maybe it wasn't so tactful to tell them Betas were more motivated than Alphas because they had to be. Or maybe he'd never get the chance to argue it again. He'd told them she was the best he'd ever seen, and it was true.

He remembered the first time he'd seen her, at the stage school where he went to watch every end-of-year performance, ostensibly because he was one of the governors. Nearly every year, he would find someone who was not just an actor but a chameleon, someone made for this kind of work, and persuade them to modify their career plans slightly. But it wasn't always an Alpha. Of course all the starring roles were played by the Alpha kids with the rich parents who had to be obliged. But now and then some bit-part player, some spear-carrier even, would catch his eye.

Not that she'd been any spear-carrier. They were giving an ancient first-calendar play, which he'd suggested because it was largely about deception and role-playing. One with two heroines, but he could hardly recall the tall, golden-haired Alpha girl who played the lead and had all the best lines. From the moment the little dark one spoke, he was mesmerised. He'd noticed her when she first came on, because there was something in her appearance that was not quite Alpha, and if that was so, she must be very good indeed to be playing near-lead. But then she spoke, and he wasn't sure any more, he who could usually tell grade at a glance. It wasn't appearances, not mainly; there was just this quality of assurance Alphas had and other grades didn't. It was in the way they spoke and walked, and hardly anyone could fake it. But there she was playing an aristocrat's daughter and getting every nuance, every gesture, dead right. No, he decided, he must be wrong.

But then the two were exiled to the wilds, disguised as a poor brother and sister, the golden Alpha girl comically unconvincing as a boy but even more so as a peasant, while the dark one was transformed. She could have passed in the Delta warrens. When she came offstage, leaving the applause to the stars, he was waiting.

"You were good," he said. "Very good."

She glanced up sideways at him. "For a Beta, you mean?"

Out of character, her grade was obvious; she was prickly and resentful, on the lookout for insults as only beta-grades, in his experience, could be. He always felt sorry for intelligent Betas. The Federation grading system was not quite impermeable; it was possible to rise by your wits, and there were Betas doing Alpha jobs and living among them. But being accepted was something else. That assurance, that air of authority, they never had it. Even she, out of costume, didn't. That knowledge festered in all of them, and it was what made them such good material for his purposes.

"No. I meant good, full stop. I've got a job for you, if you want it, and no, I'm not a theatre manager. I'm in intelligence. You'd be good in that, too."

Her face lit for a moment before she controlled it and answered indifferently, "Work for the state? Why, what have they ever done for me?"

"I don't know, but I know what they could do for you. Make you an officer, for one thing. If you go into acting you can be as good as you like, there'll always be some incompetent Alpha blonde playing the heroine and taking the applause. Wouldn't you rather work for someone who appreciates talent?"

He hadn't missed the way her eyes kindled at the word "officer", and he wasn't surprised when she accepted. Oh, surely she couldn't have turned? Where was the advantage to her, in giving up the advancement she clearly wanted?

And yet there was always that resentment, that feeling of being not quite one of us, which was why his superiors didn't like him recruiting lower grades in the first place. Where did her loyalties lie, in the end? It was he who had given her the code name Celia, because he couldn't forget the moment in the play when she went into exile, not belonging anywhere any more, and changed her name. The utter isolation in her voice: "No longer Celia, but Aliena". For that moment, he had felt genuinely sorry for her fictional predicament, had wanted to give her back the name that made her part of society, his kind of society.

Had she turned alien again, after all?  
***

We were on another run, with the hold full of forged currency and very real diamonds, when the Federation patrol ship showed up on screen. She laughed. "Hold on to something."

She speeded up, banked steeply, went into a long dizzying dive, came out of it just as I started to think she couldn't. As they fired, she was already swerving out of their line, then hurling the ship back over again before they could get a fix on her. I was sliding about the flight deck, hanging on to consoles, chairs, whatever I could find, bruising myself at every turn. She was smiling all over her face, her eyes alight, looking more alive than anyone I'd ever seen. She threw her head back to get the hair out of her eyes; it was all over the place and she couldn't spare a hand from the controls. I staggered across to her, lurching from one hand-hold to another, and brushed it back; it crackled like sheet-lightning. I buried my face in it, hanging on to her and kissing her neck while she laughed and shouted insults at the patrol ship falling behind. She tasted faintly metallic; she'd been working on the engines earlier and I could still smell a trace of the oil in her hair.

Hours later, she lay back in the bath and said "You can wash my hair now."

"Yeah, what did your last maid die of? Screw you and your Alpha bloody hair."

I knelt by the bath and eased her head back, scooping the scented water in my hands and pouring it. Her hair flowed under the surface like alluvial gold. I lifted it in my hands, untangling it with my fingers, and washed it in wheatgerm, camomile, all the oils and conditioners I used to keep its brightness from fading any more. When I had dried it and brushed it until it flew up from the bristles, she ran a hand through the heavy softness and said "Ah, that's better. Certainly smells better."

I wrapped a curl around my finger, three silver strands glinting in it, and said "It's fine. But it was just as fine on the ship. It smelled of excitement. Danger."

She laughed softly; she understood that. "You're getting to like this?"

"With you, I do. When's the next job?"

She put an arm around me, but her eyes were looking past mine, out of the window. "It's another weapons run; I won't need you."

I clenched my hand on the curl. "I could come anyway."

"No. I don't need backup; he's the only one I deal with that I can trust completely."

I pulled free of her. "Plus you don't want him to know we're together?"

She looked surprised. "No, it isn't that at all. He never had any interest in me in that way. In fact," - she looked at me and grinned - "yes, dark and stroppy.... you'd probably stand a better chance with him yourself. But you're ex-Federation. He has every reason to mistrust that, and he'd know; his people are very careful."

"You could tell him I'm safe." No answer. I could feel my face getting hot. "You know that. Don't you?"

She surveyed me and said quietly. "I think so. And that's enough for me. I like the smell of danger, too. But I'll risk myself; I won't risk him."

***

Anand studied the confidential report from the field agent he'd sent out to check on the first field agent, and frowned. "Shit," he said, "shitshitshit".

It could be true, he knew it. That Celia had fallen badly for the very person he'd sent her to spy on. That side of her had, after all, been part of his thinking when he chose her.

"This is your target. A smuggler, with past links to revolutionary groups. We aren't sure whether she's working for them again, or just for herself. You're going to get close and find out."

She'd glanced at the photograph and laughed contemptuously. "Get close how, is she hiring staff? Her type wouldn't let the likes of me close as a friend, that's for sure." Her eyes strayed back to the golden hair.

"Oh, I think you've got close enough to people like that," he said levelly. "I saw the way you looked at your co-star. Yes, you thought she was brainless and that you could have done a better job, which you could. But you couldn't keep your eyes off her, either. And she sensed that; what talent she possessed came across far more in the scenes with you. Most people like admiration."

She studied the photo.

"It shouldn't be any hardship," he said, "this one isn't even stupid. You might enjoy it."

Well, maybe she had enjoyed it. Was enjoying it. The reports he got certainly gave every sign that she was. Then again, she was a very convincing actor. Even the lack of communication from her wasn't conclusive; it could be she was having trouble reporting without being detected and didn't want to risk what she had already achieved.

In fact, he would have to go on assuming that was so, for the good reason that if it wasn't, he could do little about it. Or, if he accepted she was besotted, he would have to hope something happened to change that. Preferably before those upstairs wanted progress reports he would have to falsify.

He read the report again and shredded it.

***

I hated it when she did the weapons runs. They were the most dangerous, and they didn't even pay very well, not compared with some of the stuff she ran. But she wouldn't say no to him.

She hardly ever talked politics. She was a libertarian, if she was anything; she thought the state ought to leave people alone to do what they wanted, as long as it wasn't positively harmful, and sometimes when it was. She was very unlike most Alphas in that; she didn't think she knew best for everyone else.

I got the impression he did. Notorious rebel or not, he sounded just like the people he was fighting; he just thought he should be the one giving the orders. I'd said as much to her, but she just told me I was wrong, and closed up. I never said anything against him these days.

I was doing housework. Not that she expected me to, but I was hanging around in case she came through on the comlink, so it was something to do. Besides, I can't live with disorder. She couldn't either, on the flight deck, but at home she never made beds or put anything away. "Oh, someone'll do it," she'd say, which was right enough. Me, mostly.

I was kneeling by the coffee table, polishing it with some spray that smelled of lemon, when the comlink crackled. "Hello. How's things?"

"Fine. You?"

"We're nearly there. Very uneventful. You doing anything interesting?"

"On my knees, servicing your lifestyle." I heard her rich, earthy laugh over the link, and then something that sounded like firing. Her laugh broke off. "Hell, where did they come from?"

"What is it? A patrol ship?" She didn't answer, but I could hear her shouting instructions to the computer. And more firing. There was a hissing sound beside me; I looked down and saw I had my finger pressed on the spray; lemon-scented foam all over the place.

Her voice came back, calm and steady. "There's a whole bunch of them. I've had it. I'm going into the middle of them."

"No! Surrender. I'll talk to my boss; you could cut a deal. There must be people you could give them."

"Yes," she said softly, "that's why I'm not getting taken." She said nothing more for a few seconds, then "Here we go". And then this almighty explosion, and the link died.

I knelt there while the room went cold, and then dark, and some hours later I thought I might try to sleep, and her pillow smelled of camomile, so I held it and slept for a while. But by the morning, the scent was already less even in bed, and when I went out of the bedroom there was only the smell of lemon everywhere, and nothing of her.

***

Anand could hardly hide his relief when she walked into his office.

"Well, well. I thought we might never see you again. The word was you were far too busy with your target."

"My target is dead, as you doubtless know." Her voice was flat, unemotional.

He nodded. "Yes. Did you manage to make time to find out what I was paying you for?"

There was a flash of anger in the dark eyes, but the report was delivered coldly and precisely. "She was running weapons to Gauda Prime for the rebel Roj Blake. He is posing as a bounty hunter and building up a force. If you authorise it, I will infiltrate his headquarters and give you him."

"Oh, and how do you propose to do that? Did she introduce you?"

"No, I never saw him. I don't know if he even knew I was with her, but if he did, he will know I was Federation. I'll go in as someone else."

Anand delayed his reply, thinking about it, and she added "I'm going anyway, whether you authorise it or not. If you don't, I'll kill him; if you do, I'll take him alive, if that's how you want him."

"Will you, now." He picked up a piece of paper from the desk and held it out to her. "I couldn't tell you this had come through, while you were out of touch. Your commission. I told you I could fix it."

She looked at it, while he tried to read her eyes. There was a touch of pride, he thought, but none of the elation he had expected. He said "I thought it was what you wanted."

"Yes," she said quietly, "I suppose it was. Are you going to send me?"

"I should really put this up the line.... but then again, I could do with a bit of a coup. And if you do pull this off, nobody will ever argue about recruiting beta-grades again. But you'll need a new name. For all you know, she might have spoken to him about Celia."

That was a new idea to her; he watched curiously as her lips parted and then clenched. She nodded, and he asked "Any preference?"

She shrugged. "Whatever. It doesn't really matter. Just" - her voice wavered momentarily - as far from Celia as you can get".

He noticed for the first time how pale her face was, how dark-ringed the eyes. She was suddenly very slight, very lost; she had that look again, of someone who didn't belong any more and never would, and he felt a stab of pity.

"All right," he said gently. "I'll find something suitable."


End file.
